Broken Prey

face; and it was hot in the field, stifling, and the leaves were sharp edged, cutting at him. What the hell had Youngie yelled? He knew what it was, but . . .
    Meth lab.
    That’s what he’d said; and Lucas remembered the smell now, the sharp tang that might have been hog urine but wasn’t. The Martins were making methamphetamine, which would probably explain their preference for privacy . . .
    Stopped: listened. Heard nothing. Pope might also have stopped, trying to pick out Lucas running after him. Lucas squatted, listening for footfalls, peering down the rows at knee-high level. He’d been in cornfield chases a couple of times, once as a uniformed cop, doing just what Youngie had the kids doing now, blocking, and once as a detective. You couldn’t see anything at eye level; too many leaves, but there was a cleared space from waist level on down, especially when the farmer used a weed suppressant.
    Lucas crawled across rows, looking down them; and then heard the sound of a man running away, still farther to the right. Lucas ran in that direction, then jumped, got above the level of the corn for just a half second, jumped again, saw what he thought was movement, and went that way . . .
     
    AND WAS HIT IN THE FACE.
    The blow came without any warning and pitched him across two rows of corn and down on his stomach. He didn’t know exactly what had happened, but the other guy was right there, and Lucas got the impression of size and red socks and heavy boots and thought one thing:
    hold on to the gun, hold on to the gun.
    He rolled, unsure of whether he’d been shot or punched, his face on fire, blood on his hands, and he saw legs and felt another blow on his thigh. He was losing it, he thought, and he dropped the safety on the .45 and pulled the trigger, blindly, hoping to freeze the other man just for a second, just long enough to get a break.
    And it worked; the other man lurched away with the explosion and Lucas caught sight of his lower body ten feet away, turned, and screamed, “I’ll fuckin’ kill you, stop . . .”
    The other man ran and Lucas rolled and fired a second shot, at knee level, missed, but the other man suddenly stopped and shouted, “I quit. I quit. Don’t shoot.”
    Lucas was on his feet now, blood streaming out of his nose and onto his shirt and suit; pain surged through his face and down his neck.
    “Get the fuck over here,” he told the big man. “Get the fuck over here and get down on your fuckin’ knees, get down on your fuckin’ knees . . .”
    And he heard Youngie, some distance away. “Davenport, Davenport . . .”
    “Over here, over here . . .”
    The other man was down on his knees, his back toward Lucas, his hands webbed behind his head. He’d done this before.
    “Look at me, Charlie,” Lucas said.
    “Look at you, who?” the other man said. He was overweight and blockheaded and going bald and thick through the shoulders and arms, like a bench-press freak. He turned just his head. “Who the fuck is Charlie?”
     
    LUCAS, STILL BLEEDING , held the man as he heard Youngie thrashing up through the field. “This way,” he shouted.
    Youngie pushed through the corn, pistol pointed at the sky, looked wide-eyed at Lucas and the kneeling man. “What happened? You shot?”
    “Naw, he hit me in the nose. Goddamn it, it hurts. It’s busted. Could you put some cuffs on this asshole? I’m leaking all over my suit.”
    They got the big guy on his feet and his hands cuffed, and Lucas put the .45 away, the stock all sticky with his blood. The guy’s wallet was chained to his belt, and Youngie jerked it off the chain, flipped it open, looked at the driver’s license. “Bobby Clanton, Albert Lea.”
    “I want a lawyer,” Clanton said.
    “Fuck you,” said Lucas. He shoved Clanton in the direction of the barn. “Walk.” To emphasize the order, he kicked Clanton in the ass, and Clanton stumbled and almost went down.
    “You need a doctor,” Youngie said to Lucas.
    “Yeah, yeah. They’re gonna push a goddamn stick up my nose and that’s gonna hurt worse than it does now . . .” He kicked Clanton in the ass again.
     
    YOUNGIE HAD SENT THE TWO young cops after the fourth man, and had called in a half dozen more on-duty deputies. “We’ll get more in here as soon as I can find the people,” he said. ‘I’m hoping the other two will hunker down in that field long enough that we can get some guys spotting the roads. If they get out of the